_HOMEBREW My 5-Foot Radio-Controlled Submarine _{By Michael Wernecke}

During early mornings at a swimming silver, carefully engraved it with hatch, torpedo tube, pool, I ran my 22-inch radio-controlled submarine. and vent locations. I made tools I didn’t have. I made I liked these peaceful moments as much as I liked templates and found a great carbide-tipped tool to building things. This gave birth to a new dream: I scribe the various locations. decided to build a submarine from scratch. I thought I was fighting a major engineering debacle

I liked the look of the Russian Alfa-class sub and when the time came to mount the watertight cylinder sent for some plans. There aren’t many photographs to the lower hull half. I made a bracket-and-clip of the Alfa submarine, and the drawings and the DOD apparatus that held the cylinder and hull in place at photos conflicted. I had to do some guessing, but I the same time. I cast the ballast weight from lead did have some general ideas. The sub would have a shot and then glued it to the inside bottom of the container of compressed air onboard to blow water sub’s lower hull. I spent many hours balancing the out of a ballast tank in order to submerge. I would sub in a flotation tank, front to back and side to side, find some bulkhead seals to pass control linkages practicing surfacing and submerging the ship. through. I would make the propeller, and I would build I thought I would never get it right. the antenna array … thus, I proceeded with the build. After adding closed-cell foam for flotation, I finally

Each day I had questions, and a rising financial achieved proper trim. Splendid! I took the ship expenditure, but I didn’t want what I had built so far to the lake and ran it. The ship worked, and I was to go to waste, so I kept moving ahead. I made the pleased. It has become a dream-come-true and a hull prototype and cast the hull halves in fiberglass source of great pride and satisfaction for me. and epoxy resin. To connect the two halves accurately and easily, I created a ridge along the inner lip of the upper and lower hull halves. I completed the prototype, sprayed it with primer, and, like fine Tiffany

Photograph courtesy of Michael Wernecke

Michael Wernecke presented at the Maker Faire in San Mateo, Calif., in May 2007. He creates Alfa hull kits and welcomes questions about his sub. ocean_tech04@yahoo.com

192 Make: Volume 10